A road-rage altercation Saturday on Interstate 30 in Little Rock ended with one man dead and another facing a murder charge, authorities said. The shooting death was Little Rock’s fifth homicide of the week and its 13th of the year.
Arista Aldridge, 45, of Little Rock died after being shot twice - once in the chest and once in shoulder - during an altercation with Chris Schnarr, 28, of North Little Rock, said Little Rock police spokesman Sgt. Cassandra Davis.
Authorities said Schnarr has been charged with first-degree murder and was being held without bail in the Pulaski County jail Saturday evening.
The altercation began about 1 p.m. in some sort of road dispute that quickly escalated as the two men drove separate vehicles south on I-30-West, Davis said.
Both drivers pulled off of I-30 at the East Sixth Street exit in downtown Little Rock and stopped near Ferry Street, just across from the Holiday Inn Presidential hotel and near MacArthur Park, police said. Aldridge reportedly got out of his white Jeep and approached Schnarr, who was driving a GMC Jimmy. Schnarr then pulled out a gun and shot Aldridge, according to police.
Paramedics initially treated Aldridge while he lay in the street, and later loaded him into an ambulance. Aldridge was taken to UAMS Medical Center in Little Rock for treatment of life-threatening injuries. He died there at 3:44 p.m., according to Pulaski County Coroner Gerone Hobbs.
Shortly after the shooting, authorities strung yellow crime-scene tape across Sixth Street at Ferry Street, preventing drivers exiting I-30 from traveling west on Sixth Street.
The Jeep that Aldridge had been driving was parked facing west in the right-hand lane of Sixth Street with its driver-side door still open. The GMC was stopped in the left-hand lane in the entrance to a parking lot.
Police placed several evidence markers in the street, including some near a piece of clothing, while crime-scene officers photographed the scene.
Davis said it wasn’t clear when or how the road rage started.
“We don’t know at what point on the interstate they were having problems,” Davis said. “Was it something that occurred earlier that made them start at each other? … We don’t know at this point.”
Additional information about the case was not available Saturday evening.
In other deadly violence last week, Forrest Abrams, 18, of Fayetteville, was found shot to death near Woodrow and 11th Street early Friday.
Kelshun Mouton, 20, was shot several times outside 8 Black Jack Court late Tuesday and died before police and paramedics arrived.
On Monday, police found the bodies of Bobby Broadway, 40, and Natasha Avery, 32, in their 1513 W. 33rd St. home.
No arrests have been made in any of the deaths.
Information for this article was contributed by Chelsea Boozer of the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.
Arkansas, Pages 15 on 05/12/2013